GIBELLINA: EX EARTHQUAKE TOWN REBORN ART CENTRE
Gibellina, near Trapani in Sicily has been elected 2026 “Italian Capital of Contemporary Art”, the first Italian town to hold this title. The project is entitled “Portami il Futuro” (Bring Me the Future), and aims to combine tradition with innovation, regenerating the concept of culture as “common good” and involving the citizens together with the artists and the institutions.
Gibellina, a small community near Salemi, was totally destroyed by an earthquake in 1968, and was reborn, thanks to the courageous initiative of the then mayor, Ludovico Corrao, who convinced celebrated artist Alberto Burri to create a landscape monument out of the rubble. The result was the Grande Cretto di Burri, one of the most extensive works of contemporary art in the world – a vast concrete labyrinth constructed over the site of the ruined town, with passages and corners that faithfully followed the former town layout.
The new town of Gibellina was built instead on a more protected site some 11 kms distant, incorporating designs and creations submitted by other celebrated Italian artists, such as Mario Schifani, Arnaldo Pomodoro, Mimmo Paladino, Pietro Consagra, Andrea Cascella, Franco Angeli and others, many of whom donated their art works to a new museum of contemporary art, named after Ludovico Corrao, which now contains a collection of over 2000 works.
The new town is an open air art gallery, with the main square named after the date of the fatal earthquake: Piazza XV January 1968.
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Info: Tel. +39.0924.524882 www.macgibellona.it info@macgibellina.it